US Ambassador to the UN Mike Waltz has accused UN Special Rapporteur Ben Saul of undermining America's fight against narcoterrorist organizations, criticizing his opposition to US military operations and President Donald Trump's Shield of the Americas initiative.
“This UN official is more concerned about the lives of narcoterrorists than the communities they destroy with drugs, crime, and illegal immigration," Waltz said Thursday.
He noted that the Shield of the Americas coalition brings together the US and 14 regional partners to combat 24 narcoterrorist organizations accused of murdering public officials and terrorizing communities.
Waltz also questioned Saul's independence, citing $150,000 in Chinese government funding earmarked for his UN mandate and his previous criticism of counterterrorism operations.
“Ben Saul, whose supposedly independent UN mandate received $150,000 from China and who condemned America's elimination of al-Qaeda's leader as a ‘revenge murder,’ now wants American military and civilian leaders investigated for confronting narcoterrorist cartels in our backyard," Waltz said.
He warned that the UN should not become “a pay-to-play laundromat for terrorists" or a platform for ideological campaigns.
Questions over Chinese funding and alleged bias
According to the US mission, UN financial disclosures for 2024 document $150,000 in Chinese government funding provided through the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to support Saul's mandate.
Correspondence obtained through freedom-of-information requests reportedly also shows that Chinese Foreign Ministry officials communicated with Saul in 2023, before he assumed his UN position, praising his lectures in China and offering introductions to diplomats in Geneva.
In May 2026, Geneva-based watchdog UN Watch published a report examining alleged bias, conflicts of interest and external funding across 13 UN special rapporteur mandates. The investigation questioned Saul's independence and criticized what it described as his failure to condemn Beijing's persecution of Uyghur Muslims under the pretext of counterterrorism.
Previous criticism of counterterrorism operations
Saul has repeatedly challenged counterterrorism designations and military operations involving terrorist organizations.
In 2022, he criticized Australia's decision to designate Hamas in its entirety as a terrorist organization, calling the measure “broad and excessive." He also described the US operation that killed al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri as potentially an extrajudicial execution or “revenge murder."
In January 2024, Saul and another UN rapporteur condemned the Israeli strike that killed Hamas deputy leader Saleh al-Arouri in Lebanon, arguing that it could constitute an extrajudicial killing.
Following Israel's June 2024 rescue of four hostages from Hamas captivity in Gaza, Saul questioned the operation's legality and suggested that aspects of the mission could constitute war crimes.
In 2025, he criticized US sanctions against Palestinian organizations, including Addameer, which the Treasury Department sanctioned for acting on behalf of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a US-designated terrorist organization.
Saul also challenged the UK's designation of Palestine Action as a terrorist organization. The group's proscription, imposed following destructive attacks on defense-industry facilities, was upheld by the UK's Court of Appeal in June 2026.
In December 2025, Saul called for President Trump and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth to be arrested and charged over US strikes against suspected drug-trafficking vessels, accusing them of ordering “mass murder."